Fortress Europe puts migrant lives at risk, says Amnesty

EU efforts to seal off Europe’s borders to illegal migrants have also shut off access to refugees from conflict, thus putting their lives at risk, Amnesty International said Wednesday. “The effectiveness of EU measures to stem the flow of irregular migrants and refugees is, at best, questionable,” said Amnesty’s John Dalhuisen. The report says the European Union spent nearly two billion euros protecting its external borders between 2007 and 2013, but only 700 million euros on improving the situation for asylum-seekers and refugees in the EU in the same period.